Open for bus-Ennis: Jessica takes centre stage at Olympic Stadium as 200,000 fans pour into park

Expectant: Olympics fans make their way to to the Olympic park this morning (Image: Barcroft)

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The Olympic Stadium opened its doors for the first time since the opening ceremony today - with Jessica Ennis taking centre stage.

A week to the day that The Queen and Mr Bean starred at the east London venue, Team GB superstar Ennis began her campaign for gold in the women's heptathlon.

A capacity crowd of 80,000 were expected for the first day of the athletics.

More than 200,000 people will descend on the park today with 24 of the 26 Olympic sports in action.

Steely determination: Jessica Ennis is ready to take on the world (Image: Michael Steele)

But the star draw for most is Ennis, who Brits will be hoping can add to the five gold medals already won by Team GB.

The thousands heading to the stadium early today faced problems on the Tube with a main line serving the Olympic Park suspended in east London.

A signal failure in the Bethnal Green area meant the Central line was suspended eastbound between Liverpool Street and Leytonstone, Transport for London (TfL) said.

Tube trouble: The Central line was suspended at Stratford train station this morning (Image: WENN)

A TfL spokesman said it was working to fix the problem and had staff at Liverpool Street directing people onto other Tube lines and London Overground services to Stratford.

"The Central line is currently suspended in both directions between Leytonstone and Liverpool Street while our engineers fix a signal failure at Bethnal Green, there are severe delays on the rest of the line," the spokesman said.

"We are advising spectators going to Stratford to use the wide range of other lines serving the Olympic Park, including national rail services from Liverpool Street and the District and Hammersmith & City lines, where passengers can use West Ham station with a short walk along the Greenway to the park.

"London Underground tickets are being accepted on local bus services."

The service resumed later, but was still running with severe delays, TfL said.

The breakdown happened hours after the Prime Minister urged people to "come back into the capital" following claims that the 2012 Games had turned London into a ghost town, with commuters and non-Olympic tourists avoiding the city.

David Cameron said the "threat of meltdown on the traffic system" had been defeated and London was "open for business" during the sporting events.

He told Sky News last night: "People said also that London wouldn't cope, the traffic would grind to a halt, the capital city wouldn't manage. That hasn't been the case either. I think the authorities have done a good job.

"Clearly there is a challenge now, though, to say to Londoners, to the British public who've helped us to, as it were, defeat the threat of meltdown on the traffic system, to say to them now actually there is a case, London's working well, it's open for business, come back into the capital, come and shop, come and eat in London's restaurants and let's make sure that all of London's economy benefits from this."

Announcements have begun at Tube stations, advising travellers to visit shops, restaurants and other attractions in other parts of London as well as the East End.

"There is a hell of a lot going on and the Tube is there for people to use," he said.

"The Boris announcements (warning of delays) stopped, as they were always planned to do. Now the message is to people to get out there and see what London has to offer."

TfL said Tube passenger numbers are already up 10% on usual levels for this time of year, with journeys to "key West End stations" up 12%.